Los Angeles is home to some of the best museums in the country – ranging from antiquities to very contemporary work. Last week we had the chance to visit several LA museums, and have listed our favorites below!
Made in L.A. 2012 (LAXART, Hammer Musuem, Barnsdall Park): For the first ever Los Angeles Biennial, LAXART, the Hammer Museum and Barnsdall park have joined together to highlight contemporary work being created by L.A.-based artists. The city-specific biennial survey has become an ever increasing trend in the past few years, with such similar events as the Based in Berlin event of last summer. For Made in L.A., the Hammer Museum played host to the majority of the biennial, with several of the museum’s galleries filled with L.A.-based works. Highlights include work from Kate Costello, Jill Spector, Meleko Mokgosi, Liz Glynn, Channa Horwitz and Lisa Williamson.
The Hammer’s partner organization for the biennial, LAXART, took a different approach by focusing on opening up their entire exhibition space to the L.A.-based artists’ collective Slanguage. In addition to occupying all of LAXART’s gallery space with an interactive exhibition that highlights some major projects and events from the collective, there is also an ample amount of contextual programming for the community, a new building facade for LAXART created by Slanguage and a public billboard project. Be sure to check out all of the amazing events and performances planned by LAXART with Slanguage, and remember that many events require an RSVP.
As part of Made in L.A., the partnering organizations have selected 5 finalists for the “Mohn Award,” which will grant $100,000 over two years to the winning artist. The winner of the “Mohn Award” will be determined by votes cast on the internet – be sure to cast your vote here!
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA): The sprawling campus of more than eight buildings that comprises LACMA is well worth a visit, with exhibitions of work ranging from the super contemporary to very old. One of the most striking works currently on view can be seen before even entering the musuem – Michael Heizer’s Levitated Mass, which is a huge boulder that has been suspended over a sloped pathway that allows visitors to walk under the seemingly precariously balanced boulder. For contemporary art, the Broad Contemporary Art Museum (BCAM) at LACMA provides a relatively small yet exceptional selection of contemporary works. Exhibition and installation highlights from what is currently on view at BCAM include Michael Heizer’s Actual Size, select works by Robert Therrien, Barbara Kruger’s Untitled (Shafted), Sharon Lockhart’s installations centered around Israeli composer and textile artist Noa Eshkol and Bruce Nauman’s installation For Beginners. We were so captivated by BCAM that we only had time to quickly visit some of LACMA’s many other exhibitions, but be sure to check out their vast collections of Latin American Art, Japanese Art and art of Ancient America – to name just a few of their collections!
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA): With three separate buildings throughout Los Angeles, MOCA always has a vast amount of exhibitions and programming showcasing contemporary art from around the world. Our favorite current exhibition is Ends of the Earth: Land Art to 1974, which is currently on view at The Geffen Contemporary until September 3, and includes work from a wide selection of seminal land artists. Other exhibitions of note include the Sky Ladder installation by Cai Guo-Qiang and the large group exhibition The Painting Factory: Abstraction after Warhol.
Be sure to stay tuned for more museum and gallery exhibition highlights and check out the amazing prints by William Eggleston, Barbara Kruger, Glenn Ligon and David Salle available on Paddle8 from LACMA!